Voices, values, and the urban village
An imagined roundtable for Cha Kwo Ling
Y. Go (TU Delft - Architecture and the Built Environment)
R. Sennema – Mentor (TU Delft - History, Form & Aesthetics)
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Abstract
In 2022, the Outline Zoning Plan S/K15/27 was approved by the Hong Kong Government, confirming the demolition of Cha Kwo Ling Village (hereinafter: CKL Village) for high-density residential development. The fate of CKL Village and the responses it instigated raises how various stakeholders value the same space differently, but lack a sufficiently comprehensive framework and inclusive, common platform to express and negotiate them. Consequently, the unarticulated heritage assets often become subordinate to urban development.
Thus, this thesis analyses four perspectives - namely the Government, the Developer, the Villager, and the Hong Konger - to understand their respective valuations of CKL Village, and whether there are potentials amidst their similarities and differences. In academia, these perspectives have previously been addressed in relation to Hong Kong's heritage; but since the Anti-Extradition Law Movement (2019), there is a need to renew the understanding of these societal stakeholders and their motivations.
Thus, this thesis serves as a theoretical rehearsal of gathering and aligning different voices, utilising UNESCO's values and attributes framework, and resonating with the first two steps of the Historic Urban Landscape concept.
In doing so, the thesis presents two key critiques against the Hong Kong Government's current heritage mechanism. Firstly, the underlying monument-based approach that fails to address heritage assets in the form of groups and landscapes. Secondly, the reluctance to engage with the existing communities who currently occupy the heritage. Finally, as the thesis framework has revealed specific and different interests for each perspective, it calls for an active negotiation between them, beyond the scope of thesis writing.